


Izzy's Girlfriend

by Blaumeise



Category: Guns N' Roses
Genre: Alternate Universe, Character Death, F/M, Terminal Illnesses, Trans Character, everybody is unhappy, lots of prejudices, prejudices, the crying game - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-11
Updated: 2020-08-12
Packaged: 2021-03-06 06:34:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 6
Words: 18,493
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25838881
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Blaumeise/pseuds/Blaumeise
Summary: Slash is suffering through community service by helping out a fellow citizen in need. When his charge's health deteriorates, Slash decides to do him one last favour: to find the love of his life, the girl he had left behind all those years ago, when he went to L.A. in a futile attempt at making it as a musician.
Relationships: Axl Rose/Izzy Stradlin, Axl Rose/Slash | Saul Hudson
Comments: 20
Kudos: 30





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This fic is pretty much based on the movie "The Crying Game". 
> 
> Yes. Izzy is dying in this fic. He won't make a miraculous recovery.
> 
> This story is set in the 80s and I tried to make people behave the way they would have in the 80s. Therefore Slash isn't free of prejudices either. He's still doing his best to be a nice guy.

Part I - Los Angeles

‘Community service. The universal punishment for the losers of the galaxy,’ Slash thought while he walked down from the little supermarket to the dilapidated apartment block. 

He balanced the brown bag carefully in his arms, making sure one hand always supported the bottom, so it wouldn’t tear this time before he reached his destination. At least it didn’t contain anything frozen that would leave him with a soggy mess of paper sticking to his hands, and a mess of groceries on the sidewalk. 

He reached the house without further accident and made his way up through filth and graffiti until he reached the one-room apartment on the third floor. 

They could have sent him somewhere else. To some old lady who was pushing her rollator around, or a double amputated veteran who spent the day yelling obscenities at the TV. Instead they had sent him to Izzy. 

"Bread, milk, marmalade, coffee." Slash put the paper bags onto the counter. "Rice, pasta, cheese and tomato-sauce."

"Thanks," Izzy said without getting up from the couch. He was having a bad day, one of those where he wouldn't bother to cook or even make a sandwich, but just lie on the couch, shifting now and then to avoid getting poked by the coil springs. He needed a bed, a real one, with a decent mattress and comfortable pillows, but for as long as he insisted on staying within his own four walls, he would have to make do with the couch.

"I'll make some tea," Slash said while he put the groceries away. He deserved a break. Facing the supermarket was bad on a normal day, but so shortly before the holidays, everybody was stocking up the pantries as if a famine was about to hit the country. 

While the water heated on the stove, he slapped butter and cheese onto a few slices of bread. He didn't have to. Doing the shopping was his job, and once per week the heavy cleaning. Not that it was much work to keep a one-room apartment halfway tidy. 

Most of the time Izzy was still able to care for himself, could prepare his own food and managed to reach the bathroom in time, but every now and then they caught first glimpses on what he had to expect in a couple of months. Whenever that happened, Slash wasn't able to just turn his back on him and leave. 

He could report it of course. The office would send a social worker to check, maybe even approve the cost for a professional nurse, but it wouldn't be what Izzy wanted. He defended his remaining independence like a dog would a bone, and whenever he let go of an inch, it was with a lot of growling and snarling and the occasional biting. 

"What are you watching?" Slash asked and tried to identify the voices arguing on TV.

"Nothing," Izzy shut the voices off with the remote control. 

No, Izzy wasn't happy about Slash's presence and he had no qualms letting him know. A neighbour had complained about the smell coming out of the apartment and eventually Izzy had been left with the choice to either accept help or find his ass out on the streets; just as Slash had the choice to either show social adjustment by helping out a fellow citizen in need or serve a year in prison for being a junky and a general loser. 

"Don't you have anything better to do?" Izzy asked when Slash set mugs and plates onto the stained coffee table. 

"Not at the moment."

Izzy snorted, but he made the effort to sit up and reach for the cup. He ignored the sandwich. There was a chance that he would eat it later, when his stomach had settled from having to digest all the pills that did nothing to keep life from trickling out of him like the filling out of a torn teddy-bear. 

"At your age? How old are you, twenty-four, twenty-five?"

Slash nodded. Not that Izzy was so much older, only three years, but he liked to behave like he was his grandfather. Maybe it was his way to deal with the knowledge that he would die; pretending that he had seen it all, done it all and that life didn't have any debts to settle with him. Sometimes Slash envied him. 

"No girlfriend?" 

Slash shook his head, not sure why Izzy asked him things he knew anyway. It could be a sign that his brain wasn't working as well as it should anymore, that he would soon face other problems than being weak and sick and no longer the master of his body. But it could also mean that he wasn't as put off by company as he pretended to be. There was a very faint possibility, that he was trying to start a conversation. 

"Was anything good on TV?" Slash asked and bit into his own sandwich, hoping that maybe Izzy would join him automatically. 

"Only crap." With a weary sigh Izzy picked up his sandwich, took a bite and chewed in slow-motion before he pushed the plate away. "I swear, if I look at the state this world is in, I'm not sad to leave it. It was barely tolerable on drugs, but sober it's no place I have any need to be."

"No." Slash said. 

There was a reason why the probation office had sent him to Izzy of all people: to show him where he would go if he went back to his old ways and eventually pushed the wrong syringe into his vein, the one that carried HIV or hepatitis C or any other deadly disease they didn't even know the name of. 

"You should get a life while you're still able to," Izzy said and something like a smile ghosted over his lips. If anything, it made him look scary; it pulled the skin even tighter over his bones and pronounced the hollows that had once been filled with flesh. A grinning skull, taunting the world of the living by reminding them where they were all heading to. "Or you might regret it one day."

"Do you regret it?" Slash asked. "Your life? What you've done?"

Izzy croaked a hoarse laugh and Slash caught a glimpse on his broken teeth. "Regret what? That I wanted a band? That I came to L.A. to get it? That I tried to take my chances and failed? What is there to regret?"

"I don't know." Slash knocked a cigarette out of his last pack and lit it. 

"Give me one, too." Izzy stretched out his hand. 

Slash hesitated. He had only been released under the condition that he could provide an address and he was grateful that his grandmother had taken him back. She was a tough old lady and kept a tight rein on all aspects of his life, including the number of cigarettes he smoked per week. She had threatened to throw him out the moment he started doing stupid things and he didn't fool himself by believing in idle threats. 

"You're eating my sandwiches, so give me a cigarette."

"It will do your cough a shitload of good," he muttered, but handed one over. 

Izzy laughed. "I'm touched by your concern, but I think I've reached a point where it doesn't make a difference whether I'm a junk-food-eating chain-smoker or torture myself with rabbit-food and Jane Fonda's fitness program." He took a deep drag and coughed some more.

Slash pulled the pillow out from behind his back, tried to fluff up the meagre filling and pushed it back into place. 

"No, I don't regret my life." Izzy smirked. "Respectable people die, too, you know. They only have a lot less fun before they do.”

Slash laughed softly. “But at least society will pity them.”

"If I was back in Lafayette and had to face the same decision, I would do everything in exactly the same way." He blew smoke into the air. "Or maybe not everything."

"No?" Slash sipped tea and waited. This was probably the longest talk ever since he had taken up his plight as Izzy's helper. The only other time he was lavished with so much attention was when he played on the beat-up electric guitar Izzy still kept in a corner. His fingers wouldn't obey him anymore and he could sell it to make a few bucks out of it, but Slash fully understood why he wouldn't do it. It was a guitar and some things were worth more than the actual price asked for them. 

'You're good,' Izzy had told him. 'Go and find a band.' 

He hadn't known that he was poking his finger into an open wound and that Slash's dream to be a musician was just as over as Izzy's life would be in a couple of months. Getting back into the scene, the clubs, the bars, the drugs and the bands was just one step away from going back to jail. 

"There's this girl I knew." Izzy shifted and took another drag, this time managing to suppress the coughing before it had a chance to fully erupt. "When I went on my way to L.A, I left her behind."

"Yeah," Slash said. "There are things girls just don't understand."

"She wasn't like that." Izzy's lips twitched and his eyes turned wistful. "She understood. I wonder … if I had asked her… I wonder if she would have come with me."

"Why didn't you?" Slash picked the last crumbs of his plate. 

Izzy sighed. "That's difficult to explain. Suffice to say that I didn't and that she was too proud and too stubborn to ask. So I left her behind. At that time, I thought it was for the best, but now I wonder what would have happened if I had brought her along."

"You could give her a call," Slash suggested. "Ring her up. Maybe she has forgiven you."

Izzy shook his head. "Look, I don't believe in this shit. I've hurt her and left her. That's a choice I've made. Hopefully she's happier than I am. Believe me, she deserves it. I'm not going to rip her right out of her life just because I want to cry over my mistakes and relive a couple of old memories before it's over."

"Maybe she would be happy to hear from you," Slash said. "Maybe she's been missing you just as much as you are missing her."

"And maybe she got over me. She'll be thrilled if I call her and say something like 'Hi, baby, you know what, I'm dying, but I wanted you to know that I love you and don't you want to come to my funeral?' That has nothing to do with making things right, that's the most egoistic bullshit there is."

He broke into another coughing-fit and Slash decided it was better to let the topic go. He had to clean the bathroom before he left, take out the trash and go through the fridge in a search for rotten food. 

The TV went back to life and while he was scrubbing the shower the theme melody from some old rerun sounded out of the main-room. 

"I'll be back tomorrow," he said when he was done. "Anything you need before I leave?"

"Tomorrow?" Izzy leant back onto the arm's-rest and turned his head barely enough to look at him. "Tomorrow is Christmas."

Slash shrugged. "Then I'll bring you a turkey-sandwich." He reached for his jacket. "See you tomorrow, Izzy." 

Izzy didn't reply. His attention was already back on the TV screen. 

###

Instead of turkey-sandwich they had pizza for Christmas-dinner. Slash couldn't say whether it was the season or the fact that he was feeling better, but Izzy was in an unusually mellow mood. 

"I've stumbled across the photo," he said when Slash made coffee and pushed a tape into the player. "Do you want to see it?"

"Which photo?" He poured milk into Izzy's cup and added sugar, not because it was the way Izzy drank his coffee, but because it was a good occasion to sneak a few extra calories past him. 

"This one. Of me and her. I don't know why I still have it. Has probably gotten between my shit when I left Indiana."

"No chance you've kept it for sentimental reasons, huh?"

Izzy snorted and snitched the photo over the table. "I told you I don't believe in this shit." 

Slash almost didn't recognize Izzy. "How old is this?" he asked and tried to reconcile the long-haired, healthy kid with the haggard, geriatric-looking guy on the couch. 

"Ten years, give or take. It was taken on somebody's birthday and we were all stoned out of our heads."

Eventually Slash managed to force his attention away from Izzy and towards the girl in his arm. 

"Pretty," he said, although it wasn't even close to the word he was looking for. Beautiful was just as wrong, good-looking, handsome, sexy, nothing seemed to fit. Her appeal was coming from something else, something that didn't lay on the surface, but was outside direct perception. 

She was tall, almost as tall as Izzy, slender and dressed in jeans, a lose t-shirt and boots. She didn't have much in common with the girls Slash usually took out to parties, who wore short skirts and tight shirts and enough make-up to repaint the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel. 

Izzy's girl didn't show off her body, she was hiding it. She didn't bother to smile either, just leant against him, lips pulled into a straight line, staring defensively into the camera. Slash could make out a couple of freckles around the nose, so if she wore make-up, it could only be minimal; no lipstick, no eye-shadow, nothing. 

"What's her name?" he asked.

Izzy hesitated for a moment, like her name was a secret he wasn't yet ready to give away. 

"Alexa," he said eventually. 

She was the type of girl Slash wouldn't have spared a second thought about; one of those chicks with more brains than curves, who wanted to talk and had an opinion about everything, but when push came to shove, they refused to open their legs. He wondered what Izzy had done to crack her.

The only truly pretty thing about her was her hair; long and red and shiny, but what eventually gave him inkling that he understood Izzy's attraction were her eyes. They were sharp and clear, the eyes of somebody who wasn't fooled easily. No matter how much pot Izzy had given her, she was so aware of her surroundings, it was scary. 

Slash handed the photo back and was surprised to find himself in the centre of Izzy's questioning gaze. 

"Nice girl," he said. 

Izzy chuckled as if something amused him to no end. 

"She was a bitch," he said. "Never knew what she wanted, changed her mind every other minute, and driving you mad was her main purpose in life."

"Then why do you miss her? You should be glad you've gotten rid of her."

Izzy smiled. In all the time of their forced community, Slash had never seen him so alive.

"Because she was worth every little bit of trouble she gave you. She was wild and crazy and untamed, but for those short moments when I had her, really had her, I mean, when she gave up all her defiance and bravado and was just…" He broke off. "Ah, what the hell. Why are you sitting here and listening to old shit anyway, huh? I thought Christmas was a family holiday."

Slash shrugged. "We don't make a bit drama about Christmas. My Mom and my brother are visiting my father in England and I can't leave the town, so go figure."

"And you've got nothing better to do than wasting your time here of all places? Dude, I start to wonder if there isn't more reason to worry about you than about me."

Slash poured himself another coffee. His mother had suggested spending Christmas in L.A, that they could visit his father at any other time, that it didn't have to be the first Christmas after he'd been released. Slash had told them to go, not only because his brother had been looking forward to England, but mainly because the word 'jail' hung over his head like a stigma. 

Not that his mother was judging him or making any accusations, but he knew that she was worried; worried that it was only a question of time until he was back on drugs, back in prison, until he was found dead on a public toilet with a needle in his arm. 

Slash could have reassured her at least in one point. He wouldn't go back to prison. He would rather kill himself than let that happen. 

"What are we watching later?" he asked and flipped through the channels. 

Izzy raised an eyebrow. "Because you're planning on staying how long exactly?" 

"Why, are you going out tonight?" Slash grinned. If Izzy wanted him gone, he would simply throw him out. That he hadn't told him to leave was a sign that he found some kind of comfort, if not pleasure in his presence. Maybe Christmas turned dying into an especially lonely business. 

Slash settled back and opened a bag of crisps. His grandma had refused to give him money, but she had provided him with enough edible goods to pass the night. No alcohol though. 

Izzy's apartment was a dump, it smelled of urine and sickness and Slash was positive that no amount of cleaning would ever change that. Not that he had tried all that hard. Still, it made him feel more at home than his own room at his grandma's place ever had. Maybe it was law-enforcement that had brought them together, but he had the feeling that in another life and under luckier circumstances, they might have been friends.


	2. Chapter 2

Several weeks later Slash still couldn't get Izzy's girlfriend out of his head. She was the only link to Izzy's other life, the evidence that he hadn't been born as sarcastic and world-weary as he was now, but that his fire had simply burned out at a time when life should still have been pouring fuel into the blaze. 

Alexa was the proof that once upon a time, Izzy's flame had burned just as bright and warm as everybody else's, and that under the thick layers of ice and indifference it still fought its lost cause. 

Something had been irritating about the photo though, something Slash couldn't really put his finger on and he was curious to learn more about Alexa. Several times he tried to bring the topic up, but Izzy's usual reaction was stubborn silence.

"She had too many problems for one single person," was the only reply he ever got to his questions about why they had separated. "And I wasn't the right one to solve them for her."

The break up could have been caused by pretty much anything, and Slash couldn't stop speculating about the reasons. Infidelity, pointless fights, money, drugs, or even a pregnancy. The possibilities were endless. 

One day, when he was taking out the trash, he found the crumpled picture between a fatty doughnut bag and an unpaid electricity invoice. He pulled it out and smoothed it on his leg before he looked at it again. Izzy and his bitchy girl. She had still the same expression, hostile and wary, leaning against Izzy as if she owned him and dared the world to contradict her. Maybe that was the big difference between those two and other couples. Both, their postures, their stance spoke more of possession than of love. Two who belonged together, not because they had chosen each other, but because the alternative was not an option.

Slash pushed the photo into the back-pocket of his jeans. 

Whatever had separated them, it must have been the biggest, most cruel misunderstanding in the entire world. 

###

The decline came faster and far more sudden than Slash had expected. Spring had just made itself known when the wheel was irrevocably turned into the wrong direction. It was one of the first days that were warm enough to leave his jacket at home, where music blared out of open windows and children licked ice-cream out of cones and smeared popsicles over their faces. 

The days before, Izzy had been already been wonky. For weeks he had been running a fever that came and went at irregular intervals, but never granted him a pause for more than a day or two. It had drained him of what little energy he still possessed. Slash had started to check on him first thing in the morning and usually he also found an excuse to drop by a second time during the evening. 

Not that he had bothered much about free days, working schedules or anything else during the last weeks. Dropping by had turned from a job into something else, not friendship, but rather a feeling of responsibility. All he knew was that he wouldn't be able to sleep if he hadn't made sure the evening before that Izzy was OK for the night. 

On his way up the stairs he could hear the different TV-programs, talk-shows, game-shows, soaps, sport, cartoons or the hundredth repeat of Bonanza and the Partridge Family. Nobody in this house had a regular job and the crying of children was mixed with the bitching from fighting couples or the noises of somebody making yet another baby. The walls, thinner than paper, didn't even leave the illusion of privacy. 

Izzy's apartment was dead quiet. It was enough to make Slash nervous even before he pushed the key into the lock. Izzy never slept through the night and usually his TV blared through the morning-hours just like everybody else's. 

The room was empty.

Slash called out Izzy's name. It was useless as the only other place he could have gone to was the bathroom. It was unlikely that he had left to buy cigarettes or go for his morning-run. 

Slash stared at the inch-wide ray of light that escaped through the gap beneath the bathroom-door. 

"Izzy?" He knocked, hoping for a rude reply, something about every man having the right to take his morning-shit in peace. Eventually he took a deep breath and opened the door.

"Jesus Christ, Izzy," he groaned and crouched down next to him. 

Whether Izzy had stumbled and knocked himself out on the sink, or whether he had fainted first and taken a bad fall, Slash couldn't say and didn't bother to find out. 

He almost expected to not find a pulse, but when he felt the slow beat under his fingertips, he realized that he had to do something. There was a phone-box, only a couple of steps down the road and if he was lucky, the local youth hadn't found the time yet to put it out of order.

He didn't bother to lock the door, there was hardly anything worth stealing anyway. Jumping more than running down the stairs, he took entire blocks of steps in one leap and already patted his pockets for change before he had even reached the phone box. 

"I need an ambulance," he blurted out as soon as the receiver was picked up on the other end. He chocked out his name and the address, and without waiting for confirmation he slammed the receiver back into its holder and ran back up to the apartment. 

A small group of people had assembled in front of the open door, happy about the welcome interruption form the repetitive TV program. Slash forced his way past them and slammed the door right into their curious faces. The last thing Izzy would want was delivering the early morning entertainment for his neighbours. 

The bathroom was almost too small for the two of them. Slash crouched down again, fretting about what to do. Somewhere he had heard that it was wrong to move an unconscious person. Izzy was breathing and he had probably spent several hours in this position, so he reckoned that it was safe to just leave him lying as he lay for a few more minutes. 

He took a towel and dapped carefully at the wound at the back of his head, before he remembered that Izzy's blood was far from safe. He took a step back, settled on the toilet-seat and waited until he heard the paramedics knock against the door. 

They pushed him out of the way as soon as he opened, and barged in like an overeager police-squad. One of them muttered something about a 'pig-sty' although Slash thought that it looked rather clean compared to the usual dirt. 

He stood in the main-room and watched how two men squeezed into the little bathroom, yelled at Izzy and ordered him to wake up. Eventually he really opened his eyes and vacantly stared at the ceiling. Slash watched how they covered the head wound, how they put him onto the stretcher and carried him out of the apartment. 

He locked the door before he followed the paramedics down to the waiting ambulance.

"Which hospital?" he asked when they closed the door. 

"University," one of them said. "But it's gonna take some time until you can see him, so no need to hurry."

Slash nodded and walked down the street to the next bus-station, still annoyed that they had refused to let him ride in the ambulance car. He was good enough to clean up Izzy's shit, that was OK, but as soon as it came to a simple stupid ride to a fucking hospital, it was 'sorry, son, but you're no relative'. If they had waited for relatives, Izzy would still be lying in that shithole he called home. 

At least they hadn't given him the wrong hospital. The bus ride took almost an hour and he spent another thirty minutes asking around before somebody deigned to tell him which ward to go to. Then he stood in line with concerned parents, husbands, wives and children, waiting for news. 

He had just bought a cup of weak coffee and taken a bite out of a tasteless vendor-machine sandwich, when a nurse eventually told him curtly that they were done with Izzy and that he could see him. 

"Dude, give me a warning next time," Slash said and pulled a chair towards the bed. 

"So the surprise was a full success, huh?" Izzy pulled his lips back and showed bad teeth in a failure of a smile. To stitch up his head-wound, they had shorn-off his hair. Not that it was a big loss. It had been a stringy, unwashed mess, but this clean, disinfected version of Izzy was a far stronger reminder of the time running out than his previous stage of wilful neglect. 

"I guess your job is done, right?" he continued in a rough but steady enough voice. "What are they going to do? Assign you to some other poor bastard who would rather be left alone?"

"No." Slash swallowed. "No, I mean, as soon as you're back home I'll come to your place of course and…"

"Don't start this bullshit," Izzy hissed. "You know very well that I'm not going back home. You bought me a couple of months of freedom and, fuck, I suppose I've got to thank you for that, but now it's over."

"How about I come more often and…" he broke up when Izzy rolled his eyes. 

He was right of course. The last weeks had been difficult enough and it had been obvious that Izzy would soon need more than somebody doing the shopping. Slash had ignored the clear signs like he ignored everything he didn't have a solution for. But Izzy wasn't one to ignore unpleasant facts. 

"Listen," he suddenly said and grabbed Slash's wrist. "I'll tell what you're gonna do, OK?"

Slash nodded and bent forward. 

"Hospitals are expensive and there's nothing they can do for me anyway. In a day or two they'll ship me off to one of those places where the losers of our society go to die. There was a time when people went into wilderness as soon as their time was over, but now they pile them up someplace nice and clean and out of the way."

Slash blinked and Izzy laughed harshly. 

"Don't look like that. It's not over yet and I have no idea whether that's a good or a bad thing. But you, you still have a whole life lying ahead of you. I don't want you to waste it watching a sick man die, so listen. You'll go into my apartment. Do it today before that bastard of a landlord has a chance to get at it. Take everything that's worth a buck and sell it, pawn it, whatever."

"OK," Slash said. "I'll bring you the money when…"

"No." Izzy's grip around his wrist tightened. "Keep it. If there's one good aspect about all this shit then that I don't have to care about money anymore. So keep it. And don't come for visits."

"Izzy, I…"

"No visits! I don't want to see you ever again, understood?"

Slash wanted to protest, but Izzy's expression made the words stuck in his throat. 

"OK," he said instead. 

"Good." Izzy released him and Slash rubbed his arm. For somebody just one step away from the grave he still had a fuckload of strength. 

"And now do me a favour and fuck off," Izzy growled. "I'm fucking tired and I've wasted enough of my time on you."

Obediently Slash stood up. He felt tears rise in his throat, but bit them back vigorously. He wasn't the one who had reason to cry and if Izzy didn't do it, he wouldn't either. 

"You know," he said when he already had the door-knob in his hand. "I'll miss you, too."

Izzy just raised his fist, middle-finger pointing upwards.


	3. Chapter 3

There wasn't much worth selling. The TV would make a few dollars, the microwave and the guitar a few more. It was an old beat up thing, the finishing rubbed off in more places than it was still intact, and it hadn't been happy about being kept in a damp, mostly unheated apartment. It had surely seen better days, but just like Izzy it had a shitload of stories to tell and had decided to keep them all to itself. 

Slash went through the drawers and found fifty dollars in five-dollar-bills, a couple of flyers announcing the various bands Izzy had played in, a stack of photos, a small, tattered notebook and an unopened letter. 

He sat down on the dirty carpet, crossed his legs and looked at it. It was addressed to AR Bailey, Lafayette, Indiana and sported a big red stamp "Unknown Recipient". Slash stared at the 'A'. Izzy had never told him Alexa's full name, and there might be a dozen people in Lafayette Izzy was writing to. Whatever was written in there, it wasn't his business and Izzy wouldn't appreciate it if he read his private correspondence. 

The letter almost burned a hole through the crumpled envelope and his hand warmed up just holding it. With a slight pang of guilt Slash peeled it open. He took a single sheet out, not stationary, but a page of squared paper that had been ripped out of a notebook, the fringes still hanging off the perforated side. 

'Hi Babe,' he read. 'Happy Birthday. Things are going great. I'm missing you. If you have a sec to spare, it would be great to hear from you. Izzy.'

Slash let the sheet sink into his lap and stared at the scrawl. It wasn't exactly a sentimental love-letter, but for Izzy this was close to kneeling down with a rose between his teeth. 

He turned the envelope around and looked at the stamp. 1. February 1986. The letter was about two years old and it had been written at a time when things had been far from going great. Two years ago, Izzy had made the first steps on the steep downhill road which's very end he had almost reached. He had been forced to give up playing because a night on stage was too much for him. Only a year later he had lost the strength to carry a bag of groceries up the stairs to his apartment. 

Izzy had tried to contact Alexa, only to find out that she had moved away. Slash picked up the notebook and opened it. If he had already broken Izzy's trust by reading his mail, he could also read the entries in his notebook. It was filled with stuff scribbled in Izzy's untidy scrawl. Some entries looked like they had been made drunk, the handwriting barely readable, others were random letter-sequences that Slash immediately recognized as guitar-chords. There were entries that seemed to be ragged pieces of lyrics, a few calculations about expenses, but if he had expected teary diary-whining about Alexa Bailey, he had been wrong. 

Slash had almost reached the end of the thin paperback when he suddenly stopped. 

Alexa Rose Bailey, Jackson Road, 312, Ap. 29b, Chicago.

The entry was crossed out and AMANDA LAWSON, Tel. 312-509-6995/ NEIGHBOUR was written below in wonky capital letters. The last entry was encased by a rough square, drawn in thick, overlaying lines: W. Alexa Rose, Duff's, Seattle !!!

Slash folded the letter and used it to mark the page in the notebook. He couldn't say how old the entry was, whether Alexa was still in Seattle and why Izzy had suddenly stopped pursuing her. Maybe his health had been deteriorating too rapidly, maybe she was happily married with three children, or maybe he had just chickened out, convincing himself that it was useless and better for everybody involved. 

'Duff's, Seattle' wasn't exactly an address, but it was a start and if Slash was lucky, a phone-book was all he needed. He pulled the photo out of the pocket of his jeans and looked at her sharp, mouse-like face. 

"I'll find you, Alexa," he said. "And if it's the last thing I do, I'll find you and you're fucking gonna talk to him." 

All he had to do was getting her on the phone and make her listen for about ten minutes. He would explain the situation and if she refused to come to L.A. or at least phone, Izzy never had to know. Nobody got hurt if he failed, but if he had success, everybody would win. 

###

Slash couldn't even remember the last time he had set a foot into a library, and he was convinced that everybody stared at him. Awkwardly he pushed the little sheet of plastic under the monitor while the people around him, apparently all experts in microfiche-research, turned and shifted and exchanged their microfilms as if they did nothing else all day. 

It took him ages until he found the right part of the phone-book and he hoped whoever had invented microfiche was rotting in hell. When he eventually came to the D-section, he wished he had brought a notepad and not just Izzy's little book. Duffs. Lots of them. Apparently, they had all assembled in Seattle and started to breed right away. He didn't even dare thinking that Duff might also be a first name, it would complicate things infinitely. 

Maybe it would have been easier to just call this Amanda Lawson and go the same route Izzy had gone in his search. Only what should he tell her? One guy looking for an old high school love was not so unusual, but latest when the second one called every normal person would grow suspicious. 

No, he would try his luck with the countless Duffs first. Amanda Lawson wasn’t going anywhere. His gaze slipped down the column and just when he put down his pen to write 'Abraham Duff, Pacific Drive', his gaze stumbled and came to a halt: Duff's Bar.

Hastily Slash scribbled down number and address. He didn't bother to put the microfilm back into its place and almost ran out of the reading-room and out onto the street towards the next phone box. He punched in the number and waited. 

"Yeah?" A male voice asked.

"I… I'd like to talk to Alexa," Slash said and caught his breath. 

"Look, she's not in yet." Whoever was speaking at the other end sounded like he was chewing his own tongue. "Leave your number, OK? I'll tell her … oh… wait… Alexa, for fuck's sake, it would really help if you were in time just fucking once!"

Slash flinched away from the receiver, but quickly pressed it back to his ear. 

"Yeah, yeah, the traffic. Traffic's the same for all of us, you know. Here's some guy for you on the phone… No idea, he didn't bother to give me his name… Huh? ... Who am I, your fucking secretary? Ask him yourself…Hey, you can't call me that, I'm your boss!" He laughed and then he was suddenly back talking to Slash. "You won't believe it, dude, but she just came in. Here, I'll hand you over."

He listened to the creaking noises while the receiver was shifted from one person to the next, and then she spoke. 

"Hi, who's there?"

Slash didn't know what to say. He hadn't expected to reach her, not really. 

"Hullo?"

Her voice was a bit rough and suddenly Slash thought that it was fitting. Izzy's girl wouldn't be smooth and slick, she would be rough and tough, up to her voice. If this was Izzy's girl. There was certainly more than one Alexa in this world. 

"Asshole!" she snarled and the line went dead. 

Slash hung up and slipped down until he sat on the floor. It wasn't working this way. She could just say that she didn't know anybody named Izzy and he would have to believe her. Unless he held the photo under her nose. He had to go to Seattle and have a look at her, it was the only solution.

Slash crammed the handful of dollar-notes out of his pocket. He had sold everything except the guitar. His grandma hadn't been happy when he had dragged it home, but she hadn't said anything against it either. As long as he didn't play, but just looked at it, she seemed to consider it as safe. Slash couldn't play Izzy's guitar. He didn't have the right. It wasn't a little boy's plaything, but a musician's instrument. If he had ever been a musician at all, then he had stopped the day they had sent him to jail. 

No matter how often Slash counted the money, it wouldn't proliferate. If he hitch-hiked, it should bring him up to Seattle and pay for a couple of nights in a cheap hotel. Sure, he wasn't allowed to leave town, but he was only an unimportant little ex-junky. They would put his name into the computer and forget about him. He only had to stay out of trouble in Seattle, take care that no cop thought it was worth checking out his identity, then he should be fine. At least long enough to have a closer look at Alexa Bailey or Alexa Rose or whatever name she was currently using. 

"Hey!"

Slash looked up when somebody kicked angrily against the door. "Are you camping in there?"

He scrambled to his feet, mumbled an apology and left the phone-box. Hands thrust into his pockets he marched down the street, kicking rubbish out of the way. He owed Izzy this much. Why he wasn't sure, but there was this huge feeling of an unpaid debt in his chest. He would go to Duff's Bar, have a look at the girl and with a bit of luck he would be back home before his probation officer even noticed that he was gone.


	4. Chapter 4

**Part II - Seattle**

Duff's Bar could hardly be called an in-place. It was a sleazy, disreputable hole in the wall, the interior dark and worn down, the floor dirty, the liquor-supply abundant. Slash felt at home the moment he set a foot over the threshold. 

Alexa wasn't there, but he didn’t mind. Maybe it was her free day, maybe she was late or sick. Whatever the reason, it gave him the time to check out the place and get a feeling for it. If he didn't feel like a stranger anymore, maybe it would help to grow the confidence he needed to talk to her. He sat down in a corner at the window and the waitress, a pretty, dark-headed girl, brought him his beer. 

Outside it looked like rain. The sky hung so deep that the grey clouds almost touched the roofs of the buildings. People hurried up and down the street, hoping to make it home before the first drops would fall. The sky was never like this in L.A., thick and brooding, until he thought he only had to reach up to bury his hands right into the clouds. 

Slash's determination dwindled with each minute that passed. What the hell had he been thinking? He couldn't just barge in and ask her to go and visit Izzy. He had no idea what had happened between them. What if it was something so bad that reminding her was enough to provoke a nervous breakdown? Or what if Izzy was really better off without her? It wouldn't be fair to destroy his carefully nurtured memories about the love of his life by presenting him the bitchy, real living version. 

Maybe what he was doing here was far less about doing something good than about his wish to do something for Izzy and pay a debt he shouldn't even feel was there. Maybe he was just desperately trying to correct at least one of the mistakes life made all the time. Do something that was right for a change. Prove to himself that he wasn't the failure everybody saw in him. Receiving absolution from a world that had stopped caring for him ages ago. 

Slash came to the conclusion that it was better to be cautious. He would watch her, try and get to know her and get an impression about who she really was. Maybe he could even find out what had gone wrong between her and Izzy, whether it was something that could be healed or if the damage was beyond repair. 

He had just taken another sip when the door swung open and the beer went right down the wrong way. He coughed and snorted and just when he thought he had the disaster under control, he knocked the glass over and spilled beer over his pants. Slash looked up and stared directly into a colourless face with uncomfortably sharp eyes. 

Alexa stopped. She wiped a handful of thin, red hair back and stared at the mess he had left on the table. 

"You're lucky it's not my shift," she said and continued her way towards the bar. 

She leant onto the counter and Slash couldn't help but stare at her back. Her hair was longer than on the photo. It reached down to the mid of her back, but the rest of her body hadn't changed at all. It was just as skinny with bony elbows poking out of the sleeves of a baggy T-shirt, and thin legs wrapped into tight jeans. Still no figure to speak off. Her body was all angles and straight lines.

"Hi, Claire," she said loud enough for Slash to hear. "Is Duff in?"

Claire, the dark-headed waitress, shook her head. 

"No idea when he's gonna come. Dentist appointment."

"Oh really?" Alexa drawled. "So the pain finally overrode the fear?"

"Don't tell him I told you," Claire said. "He's extra chosen your day off so you wouldn't make fun of him for the rest of his life."

"I might refrain from it if he gives me a raise. So, you're alone with that klutz in the corner who hasn't learned how to drink out of a glass yet?"

Slash quickly looked out of the window, suddenly very glad about his decision to not talk to her right away. It would take some time until he learned to accept her as a real person. He had spent so much time thinking about her, wondering how she would be, how she would move, talk, but she had stayed a girl in a photograph: static and very far away. 

Now she was there, right in front of him and he had no idea how to react. There was something uncontrollable about her, something a photo hadn't been able to capture. It was intriguing and fascinating and at the same time made him back off. She wasn’t pretty, but still attractive in a reckless way. The lines of her face however expressed a certain hardness, something the girl leaning against Izzy as if she owned him hadn't known yet. 

"You gonna wait for Duff?" Claire asked, but Alexa shook her head. 

"It's not important. I was just in the area and wanted to ask him something, but God knows how long it's gonna take to refurbish his deteriorated teeth."

Slash thought about leaving. The air, formerly only laden with stale smoke and the smell of cheap liquor, now sizzled with electricity. Alexa's presence was enough to turn a harmless bar into a nuclear power station. He thought about crawling under the table or melting into the wall. Bathroom! They had to have one. He quickly scanned the room, but noticed to his dismay that in order to reach it he had to pass her with hardly more than four feet distance. Impossible.

Before he had the time to make a decision Alexa said good-bye to Claire and headed out. Passing by, she cast him another glance, less annoyed this time, more amused, like he was retarded, but in an endearing kind of way. Then she was gone and the tension left with her. The whole room settled and turned into an ordinary bar again. 

Slash waited only long enough until he could be sure to not run into her on the street, then he paid and left himself. The wind had gotten stronger and carried traces of salt. Damp air crept under his jacket and up the legs of his jeans to curl its icy fingers into his flesh and around his bones. He needed warmer clothes. 

His tiny hotel room was only a couple of blocks away and was usually rented out by the hour. One of the local pimps hanging out in front of the entrance had grown suspicious before he had even set a foot onto the staircase, had caught him by the arm and told him that it was a bad idea to set up business in his territory. 

This time he managed to reach his room without being bothered, and tired he kicked off his shoes and crawled under the blanket. The room was just as damp as the air outside and offered no protection against the chill. Slash's gaze travelled along the trail of mould-stains at the ceiling. It started in the corner to the left of the bed and ended over the window where it peeled the paper right off the wall. Outside a tree twisted its naked branches towards the sky in a frozen mockery of a rain-dance and while he still tried to get warm the first drops already scraped with sharp fingernails over the glass. 

Getting to know Alexa wouldn't be too difficult. If he returned to the bar during her shift, he was convinced that she would remember him. He had made enough of an ass out of himself. It would take far more time to find out whether she still harboured any feelings for Izzy and therefore he needed to find a better place to stay and also a job. Izzy's money wouldn't bring him any further than to the end of the week and he wasn't keen on breaking his promise that, no, he wasn't going to set up any kind of business in this quarter. It was time to tackle the whole matter systematically. Room. Job. Alexa. If Izzy had cracked her shell, he would manage it, too. 

###

Slash waited a couple of days before he returned to Duff's Bar. He had chosen a weekday-evening, hoping it would be busy enough to make his presence not too obvious, but still not too crowded for Alexa to spare him a couple of minutes. 

She was there. Slash spotted her as soon as he had entered. She stood behind the bar and talked rapidly to a tall, lanky guy who was maybe in his early thirties. He moved quietly through the crowd and towards the bar, feeling a little bit like a hunter stalking his prey and looking for cover with every step he made. 

There were several free stools and he picked one that was neither too far away from her, but didn't make it seem like he was following her around. 

"Look, Alexa, I see that this is a problem," the man she had been talking to, said. He wiped shaggy blond hair out of his eyes and his face obtained a sorrowful expression. "But I really can't pay you more than I'm already doing, OK?"

"No, it's not OK, I …"

"Alexa!" He sounded tired, like somebody who was going through the same discussion for the hundredth time. "If you don't go and sell a few drinks instead of whining into my ear, I'll soon have a problem paying you at all, you know. This bar isn't exactly a gold-mine."

He turned abruptly and busied himself arranging bottles on the shelves. Alexa didn't seem disappointed and Slash got the feeling that this was a general issue between her and her boss, one she probably brought up every other day. When she turned around Slash didn't react fast enough and again, he was forced to look directly into her eyes.

"Heh, that's you," she said and permitted a faint smile. It was more mocking than friendly, but her eyes softened for a moment. It was more reassuring than Slash had expected. "What would you like to pour all over yourself today?"

He ordered a beer and was surprised when instead of leaving him to his drink, she propped her arms onto the counter right in front of him and mustered him full of curiosity. 

"Tell me your name, cowboy," she said.

"Slash," he replied.

"How cool." She smirked. "I've never seen you here before and now you're here twice within just one week."

"I moved into the area," Slash took a sip.

"Congratulations." Alexa wrinkled her nose in disgust. "From your accent you didn't only move into the area, but into the state."

"Yeah, kind of. You're not from here either," Slash tried to turn the table.

"No?" she raised an eyebrow. "Then tell me where I’m from."

'Lafayette, Indiana,' lay on his tongue, but he resisted the urge to impress her. "Midwestern, I'd say," he tossed out instead. 

"Chicago," she said and Slash smirked at the little lie. Alexa didn't seem to harbour fond memories about her hometown. 

"And where do I come from?"

"Easy," she said. "Want another one of those?" she pointed at Slash's empty glass and he nodded, allowing her to buy a little time while she fetched him a new one.

"California," she said. "You tried to make it as an actor, but they told you the best you could hope for was doing commercials. They gave you a role as the kiddie who is eating his breakfast-cereals, but you spilled the milk all over you."

Slash laughed. "Good guess, but, no, if there's one thing I'm not, then it's an actor."

"Pity. You've got the looks. And you still haven't told me what you're doing here."

He shrugged. "What are _you_ doing here?"

She held up his glass. "Serving drinks, Einstein? And wiping them up when there are guests like you."

"You know what?" Slash took the glass out of her hand, put it down onto the counter and leant forward as if he was about to tell her a secret. "I usually don't spill my drinks."

"That's really a huge relief," she whispered before she straightened. "And I'd love to stand here for the rest of the day and chat with you, but Duff," she pointed backwards over her shoulder, "is a slave-driver. He'll throw me out and let me starve to death. He has no scruples at all."

"I heard that," Duff said without looking up. He was busy going through the cupboards now, constantly scribbling things onto a notepad. 

Alexa shrugged. "It's true."

"How about…," Slash swallowed. This was too fast. He should take it slow, come back, get to know her step by step instead of rushing forward.

"How about what?" she had already made moves to leave but now she stopped and waited for him to finish the sentence.

"How about we're having a drink somewhere when you're done working?"

The little smile vanished and she narrowed her eyes. "No."

For a moment Slash thought she wanted to add something, but instead she just walked off. 

"Alexa!" He rose from his stool, but before he brought out another word, Duff stood suddenly right in front of him. 

"How about you have another drink," he said. "On the house."

"Look, all I did was…"

"All you're doing is sitting down and having a drink," Duff said. His voice was friendly, but his expression spoke another language, and before Slash knew what he was doing, he sank back onto the stool.

"I didn't do anything," he said bitterly. Maybe he had acted a little fast, but she didn't have to react as if he was molesting her.

"I know," Duff said. 

Slash wished he would go back to counting his bottles or whatever it was he had been doing. Instead he seemed determined to grow roots where he was. 

"What's your name?" he asked.

"Slash," Slash said, annoyed by the patronizing tone. What was coming next? Did he have to show his ID? Leave his fingerprints?

"OK, Slash." Duff refilled his glass and Slash was slightly mollified by the resupply of alcohol. "Just leave Alexa alone, OK?"

"All I did was asking her out for a drink," he snapped. "Why does everybody react as if I groped her ass or something?"

Duff sighed. "Calm down, OK?" he ruffled his blond hair until he looked like an electrocuted feather duster. "Alexa is not the right one for you."

"And you can say that how exactly?"

Duff smirked and for reasons not quite clear to him, Slash found it hard to stay angry. 

"Because I know Alexa."

"I don't want to marry her, Slash snapped, "I only wanted to talk to her, that's all." 

This was ridiculous. 

"Is she your girl or what?" he asked when Duff didn't reply. 

Duff broke into a slightly hysteric bout of laughter.

"Jesus, no." He wiped tears out of his eyes. "That'll take a crazier man than me." He sobered. "Look, I have a reason to say this, OK? It's not that I think you're a nutter and that you're gonna slit her throat and dump her in the Sound. It's just that Alexa really isn't interested in dating."

"A drink is not a date," Slash said stubbornly. 

Duff gave him a pitying look and patted his arm. If any other person had done that, he would have exploded, but coming from Duff it seemed to be an honest gesture of friendly understanding. 

"You don't know somebody who would give me a job, do you" Slash asked, not willing to discuss Alexa and her obscure revulsion towards dating any longer. And it wasn't even a date. He wanted to ask her about Izzy, that was all. 

Duff wrinkled his forehead. "There's a supermarket down the street," he said eventually. "Friend of mine used to shelf stuff there, but he got his ass fired on Monday. If you're lucky the position is still open."

"Thanks." Slash searched for money to pay his drinks, but Duff shook his head. "You're going bankrupt like this. Do you do this with all your customers"

"Nope." Duff grinned. "It's just…," he scratched his head, "you're so normal."

"I'm what?" Slash thought he hadn't heard right. People had called him punk, thug, hippie. But normal?

"Yeah. Usually it's always the nutters who are after Alexa. The nice guys go for Claire."

"And do you jump up to protect Claire's virtue whenever somebody asks her out on a drink, too?"

Duff's grin broadened. "Nah, Claire is a nice girl. I trust her not to hurt my customers. Alexa however…"

Slash snorted. 

"Heh!" Duff raised his hands in a gesture of defeat. "I'm only worried about your safety. If you lose some vital body-parts, don't come to me and complain. I warned you."

Slash smiled and backed off, but he didn't believe a word. This wasn't about him or Alexa not being interested. This was about something completely else, something deep enough to make Alexa run off at the simple mentioning of going out, while her boss jumped to her defence like Sir Lancelot in hope of a night with Guinevere. 

He downed his last sips and stood up.

"See you," he said and Duff nodded before he picked up his notepad again. 

Slash caught a brief glimpse on Alexa serving tables at the other end of the bar and he couldn't help the feeling that she kept as much of a distance between them as possible. She briefly turned her head into his direction, but quickly looked away when she noticed his attention. 

And then he recognized the mistake in the picture. Alexa wasn't a fragile flower. She worked in a bar, she was tough and she wouldn't hesitate to slap down any unwanted offer. She had run because his offer hadn't been unwanted at all. She liked him and she hadn't trusted herself to stay firm and turn him down. 

Slash closed the door behind himself and went in search for the supermarket. 

Nothing made any sense at all. According to Duff, he was the first nice guy who had ever shown interest in Alexa and if they considered him to be nice and normal, then he didn't want to think about the maniacs she usually attracted. It should make them all happy and not push them into panic. 

Something had happened to her, something that wasn't necessarily connected to Izzy, but could very well be. It was better to find out before he breached the topic. Trust. Trust was the key. If he was able to make Alexa trust him, then he could ask her about why she was so skittish and if talking to Izzy was something she would even consider.


	5. Chapter 5

Working in a supermarket was not the way Slash wanted to spend the rest of his life. Somebody was always bitching. The manager complained that he was too slow or not in time or not meticulous enough; as if it mattered whether the label on a glass of crunchy peanut butter pointed forward or backward. Customers claimed that he sent them to the wrong aisle on purpose, which was only sometimes true and most of the time happened because he didn't care enough to keep in mind where the spring-flower-scented soap was stored. His colleagues weren't overly fond of him either, his fuck ups meant more work for them and the ability to see the world-shattering importance of tagging 99 cent cookies with 99 cent tags remained about an inch outside his grasp. 

Slash knew he was always just one boot-kick away from being fired, but he fought hard to keep the job. He had found a one-room-apartment a couple of blocks away from Duff's Bar and made a habit out of dropping by when his shift ended. 

Alexa ignored him and Slash didn't make any more attempts to approach her. Instead he was trying to establish himself as a regular, hoping that eventually she would stop seeing him as a foreign object. 

It was easier than he had thought, not because of Alexa, but because Duff developed an overbearing kind of fondness for him. 

"Hey, dude," he yelled over the head of a dozen early drinkers when Slash, edgy and thirsty after a day of bagging groceries, slumped on a stool. 

"I need a drink," he groaned and let his head drop onto the bar. "And another job."

A hand ruffled his hair and when Slash looked up, there was a shot of Jack Daniels right in front of him. 

"Can I work for you?"

Duff scratched his head. "You know, I wanted to get rid of Alexa anyway. She's the worst waitress I've ever had. You know what? You can have her job."

"Ha, ha," Alexa said without the slightest trace of humour. "Then you can start right now and serve those idiots over there in the corner." She slammed a tray full of glasses with enough vehemence onto the bar to make them spill before she turned around as if to leave.

"Hey, come on," Duff caught her arm. "Don't be so oversensitive."

She struggled, but Duff didn't let her go. 

"It was a joke. You're the best waitress ever, OK? I won't substitute you. I'd be broke within a month with what Slash's putting away." 

"Yeah, right." Alexa stilled. "And there'd be hair in all the drinks, too."

"She's got a point, dude." Duff turned to Slash, looking heartbroken. "I'm sorry."

"It's OK." Slash ran a hand through his hair. "I'll stay at the market. And I'll learn shit for life, right? Like never put something heavy onto the tomatoes." 

Alexa snickered and for a moment her expression turned almost friendly. She picked up her tray, not bothering that some of the glasses were half empty, and hurried off to deliver them to their rightful owners. 

"If I asked her again," Slash said and looked after her, "out on a drink, I mean, do you think she'd be upset again?"

Duff sighed. "Why don't you just give up?"

"I like her," Slash answered. “Can just be a coffee or, fuck, we can go and get ice cream cones in the park, for all I care. I really don't want anything else." 

It was true. He did like her. There was something childlike in her defiance, a fearful little girl hidden behind an aggressive front. She was fending off people before they had even tried to attack her, and he wished, she wouldn’t feel the need. 

Alexa was made out of contradictions. Had Izzy's fascination been born out of the inner struggles that were shaking her? Had he managed to close his hands around the brittle, delicate thing that was her soul? And if so, why had he dropped it again instead of keeping it safe? 

"Yeah, right." Duff grinned. "You're only after deep and meaningful conversation."

Slash picked peanuts out of the bowl on the bar and lined them up around his glass. 

"Look, if you absolutely want to go out with her, ask her about that movie that's out now, Fatal Attraction. I think she mentioned it. Maybe she'll go with you. But you'd do everybody a favour if you keep it at that." Duff looked unhappy, like he had just been bullied into doing something that was against his religion. 

"Why are you so protective about her," Slash asked, but Duff shook his head.

"If she wants to tell you, that's up to her, you won't get anything from me." He refilled Slash's glass and left the bottle on the counter. "I've already said more than I should, OK? And I'd much rather you left her alone, but you won't anyway, so go ask her out on the movie. But I tell you, that's probably all you'll ever get out of her and she's got her reasons and you should respect that."

At the other end of the bar a customer waved for attention and Duff left to serve drinks. Slash sorted the peanuts into pairs of two, puzzling over the big mystery. Maybe she had been raped. On a date. Some asshole taking more than she had been willing to give. It would explain a lot. Almost everything, now that he thought about it; her behaviour, Duff's protectiveness. Slash was surprised at the anger this woke inside him. He didn't even know her, not really, he shouldn't care so much. 

"Asshole!" Alexa slammed the tray onto the bar.

Slash looked up startled. "What did I do this time."

"Not you," she growled, her voice dropping to a crunch deep down in her throat. "Over there. Asshole had his hand on my ass."

"Which one?" Slash asked. 

She pointed at a small man at one of the tables. All he could make out was a bald patch at the back of his head. 

"Want me to hit him?" he asked. 

She grinned. "Would you cut his belly open and make him eat his bowels?"

Slash shrugged. "Sure. But you wouldn't like that because it's rather messy and somebody has to wipe up the blood."

Alexa snickered. "Nah," she said then. "He'll order another beer in latest twenty minutes."

"And?" 

"I’ll bring him one." She smirked, but rolled her eyes when he didn't get what she was hinting at. "What has the same colour as beer?"

"You mean you're…," Slash laughed. "You piss into his drink?" He sobered and frowned at his glass. "Did you ever do that with me?"

"Only once." She propped her arms onto the counter. "No, I didn't," she hurried to confirm when Slash started to grow worried. "Really not. But Duff's almost ready to give me a raise, that's why I can't pick fights with guests at the moment. If I do that, he'd fire me. OK, he'd take me back the next day, but it would mean good-bye to the raise. Other while I would have poured his drink right into his face."

Slash doubted that she was so close to success. Duff had a better handle on her than she thought, but he didn't bother to destroy her illusions. 

"I wanted to go to the movies this weekend," he said instead. "Fatal Attraction. Care to come?"

"I've got to work," she replied, but at least she didn't run. 

"So, when you're free?" Slash asked lightly, as if all they had to do was pick a convenient date.

Alexa cast him a wary glance. "Thursday," she said eventually. "I finish at six. You can pick me up here."

"OK." Slash managed to sound nonchalant, but inside he was jubilating. "That fits with my work-schedule, too." It didn't, but he would convince somebody to take over his shift. He could offer to work Saturday evening instead, everybody wanted to have off on Saturday evening. 

"You pay," she said and smiled sweetly when the balding groper waved for another drink. "In a minute, baby," she sang, picked up a glass and vanished into the backroom. 

###

On Thursday Slash sat on a barstool and waited while time ticked by. 

Alexa wasn't ready. Slash arrived at the bar at six straight, but when he asked Duff about her whereabouts, he just shrugged. 

"She's upstairs." He pointed towards the ceiling. 

'Upstairs' was a little room. Duff had turned it into a mixture of office and crashing-place and Slash had spent a night or two 'upstairs' after he had taken too much advantage of Duff's unlimited generosity. 

"She told me to come at six." Slash kicked his heels against the chipped legs. 

"Which means that maybe she'll be ready at seven. Or not at all."

Slash sighed. "I thought this wasn't a date," he said, but felt a hint of smugness that she should spend time on tarting herself up. 

"Oh, it's not that." Duff grinned. "I mean, she stopped working an hour ago, so I don't think it's about shit like which shoes to wear, you know."

"Then what's she doing?" Slash accepted the beer Duff pushed into his direction. 

"She's just scared, I guess. She hasn't been out with anybody for ages. Maybe she has forgotten how to do that."

Slash didn't reply. It was frustrating. All he got was hints and little tidbits about the big secret looming over Alexa's head. She wasn't that special, no matter what everybody seemed to think. Cut down she was just an ordinary-looking, bad-tempered waitress in a not exactly posh bar in Seattle. 

"How come she's working for you?" Slash asked eventually. "And why don't you give her the boot? I mean, no offence, but…"

"She's as sucky a waitress as you can get, you mean." Duff chuckled. "Yeah, I know. I met her in Chicago. A friend of mine moved over a couple of years ago and I went to visit him. We had a cool evening, you know, went to a bar, had a couple of drinks, that kind of stuff. Some guy there started to pull shit on me. I guess he was just looking for a reason to fly off the handle." He rubbed the little nub on the bridge of his nose. "Anyway, I won."

"I bet you did." Slash grinned. Most of the time Duff was as mellow as a sated puppy, but when he lost his temper, he did it in style. 

"Yeah, right. I met Alexa in the ER. Whatever she had been into, she didn't win. Her nose was bleeding, her eyes were almost shut, lips split, the whole deal. But she still strutted around like she was Muhammad Ali."

"Shit." Slash couldn't share Duff's amusement. "Who beats up a girl?"

"Oh, I bet she started it." Duff cast him a crooked grin.

"Still." Slash turned his beer-glass on its mat. Some things were just plain wrong and beating up a girl was one of them. "So that's why she won't go out?"

"What?" For a second Duff looked confused. "Oh, no, that's got nothing to do with one another. We just sat there, you know, waiting for the doc and comparing our bruises, that's all. I said if she ever came to Seattle, she should visit me at the bar. I didn't expect her to do it, I mean, I didn't even give her the address, just the name. It was about two years ago. I came to open and she was there, sitting on the doorstep and asking for a job."

"And why did she leave Chicago?" Slash asked. "Not that it is my business."

"No, it's not." Duff turned away for a moment to pour drinks for a customer. "She ran into trouble," he said when he returned. "Alexa is good at getting into trouble."

"You and her, have you ever…," Slash stopped. Duff was right. None of this was his business. 

"Jealous?" Duff smirked. "No need. I guess that's why she came here. I'm safe. She’s not my type, and I’m not hers. There has never been a doubt about it. But you know what? I'll do you a favour. I'll go and get her for you, or you'll be sitting here until New Year's Eve and drink all my booze."

It took Alexa another twenty minutes to overcome whatever it was she had to overcome. Duff had been right. Going overboard with her outfit hadn't been the reason for her delay. If anything, she had dressed sloppier than usual, faded jeans and a bulky sweatshirt which's sleeves kept slipping over her hands. Her face was a bit puffy and her eyes red as if she had been crying. She had brushed her hair though, until electrostatic made the thin, split ends stand up into all directions. 

"Let's go," she said and slung her jeans jacket over her shoulder. "We're late anyway."

Slash was about to point out that it was hardly his fault, but he bit his tongue. 

They missed the beginning of the movie. People muttered when they had to stand up to let them pass, and a girl complained loudly when Slash accidentally sprinkled her with popcorn. 

They took their seats and Slash tried to concentrate on the movie. Alexa sat still and uptight next to him, hands tucked between her knees and her eyes fixed onto the screen. The tension that radiated form her was enough to make the whole room tingle, and eventually Slash felt his own muscles cramp in response. 

"Want some?" he whispered and offered her the jumbo-package of popcorn. 

She shook her head without taking her eyes off the screen. 

A minute later, when he pulled a small bottle of whisky out of his jacket, she did look at him, if only for a second, before she accepted and knocked back enough to leave Slash startled. She had never given him the impression of somebody who drank more than a beer now and then. 

Whether it was the movie or the alcohol Slash couldn't say, but during the next one and a half hours Alexa relaxed by inches. When the movie ended, she had stopped pulling herself tight, instead she had stretched out her legs and her hands lay loosely in her lap.

"Fancy some food?" Slash asked when they left the cinema and to his surprise Alexa nodded. He had taken care to keep a safe distance, hadn't tried to put his arm around her shoulders or push his hand between her thighs, instead he had behaved like a ten-year-old on his first date. His grandma would have been proud of him. 

He took her to a diner near his apartment and while Alexa studied the menu, Slash wondered how to breach the real reason for his move to Seattle to her. 

"I think we have a mutual friend," he eventually said. 

"I don't think so." Alexa put the menu down and eyed him warily. "I don't have many friends around here."

"It's somebody in L.A."

Alexa paled and Slash knew she had realized where he was heading. 

"I talked to him yesterday," he lied. "On the phone. Izzy. I'm sure you know him."

Alexa took a deep breath and was just about to say something, when the waitress came to take their orders. 

"I don't think I want any of this shit." Alexa pushed the menu away.

"Can we have another minute?" Slash asked before anybody had the time to throw them out. He tried to look apologetic and when the waitress nodded and left, he turned back to Alexa.

She didn't look at him, but had picked up the menu again, staring at the offers. 

"So, what are you going to do now?" she asked eventually. Her voice shook.

"I don't understand," Slash said. She was just as upset as he had feared she might be. 

"Why are you going out with me?" She dropped the menu and faced him. 

The fear in her eyes had been replaced by fury and Slash braced himself for an outburst he couldn't even guess the reason for. 

"Why didn't you just call it off? Or is this all just a big joke for you? Do you think this is funny? Yeah? Is this your sick idea of a good time? Do you have a couple of friends waiting around the corner so they can join in the fun?" 

Her eyes watered and for one horrific moment Slash thought she would cry. She didn't, but the unnatural shine was enough to make him curse Izzy for not telling him what had happened all those years ago in Indiana. 

"I'm going out with you because I wanted to go out with you," he said eventually. "Because I like you."

It was only part of the truth, but it was true enough. Slash started to wonder if maybe he had lit the candle from the wrong end. Maybe it wasn't Izzy who needed protection, but Alexa. 

"Oh," she said and her gaze dropped back onto the menu. "So you don't mind?" She still looked suspicious, like she expected him to laugh at her any minute, and so Slash didn't ask what it was he should mind. He just shook his head. 

"OK." She smiled weakly and wiped at her eyes. "I think I'll have a cheeseburger. Could you…?" 

She pointed at the menu, then gestured towards the bathroom. When Slash nodded, she hurried off to splash water into her face or have a less public breakdown or do whatever it was that girls did when they had an emotional moment. 

He waved for the waitress and ordered while his confusion grew in unknown proportions. Nothing Alexa had said made any sense. He couldn't believe that Izzy had done something of such cruelty that is justified a complete drawback from life. If it had been just Alexa, he would have suspected her of overdramatizing, but Duff agreed with her. Duff wasn't someone who blew up inanities, but he fiercely protected a girl he had met in an emergency room, who wasn't even 'his type' and who gave him hell on any given day in his life. 

He was torn out of his musing, when Alexa came back and slipped into her side of the booth. Her eyes were a bit redder, her face a bit puffier, but the threat of tears was gone for good. Their orders arrived only seconds later and Slash blinked in disbelief when she cast him a dazzling smile over a fork full of salad. 

"So how is he doing?" she asked. "If I didn't miss out on all the important things, he didn't hit it big."

"Not good," Slash said, not sure if he should drop the entire truth onto the table. One breakdown per evening was enough. 

"I'm sorry to hear that." 

Slash had never seen her so mellow. Instead of being pulled into a tense line, her lips barely touched each other. There was a hint of a flush on her cheeks and her voice was soft and less scratchy. He wondered why he had ever thought that she was anything but pretty. "So, what's he doing now?"

"Not much," Slash replied, searching for the right words. "He's pretty sick."

Alexa stopped chewing. "You mean really sick? Really, really sick?"

Slash nodded. "He's dying."

"Fuck," she mumbled "I mean, he's full of shit, but that…" She took another bite and fell silent. Her face was wiped clean of any emotions and her eyes lost their intensity. She had understood the message, but it would take time until she comprehended the consequences. Maybe a couple of hours, maybe a day, but eventually it would happen. 

Slash was relieved to see that it did make her sad. It was confirmation that, even if somebody had subjected her to unforgivable cruelty, it hadn't been Izzy. 

For a while all Alexa did was chewing and swallowing and Slash didn't try to involve her into a conversation. She seemed not to be in the same room anymore, instead she relived long gone dreams and memories behind vacant eyes. 

She recovered eventually and started talking again, but neither of them mentioned Izzy again.

Something had changed, though. Alexa was at ease. The tension that had been as much a part of her as the red hair, the pointy face and the suspicious look was gone. She smiled, she sought out eye-contact and all of a sudden Slash realized that she was flirting with him. It shouldn't have made him as happy as it did. 

When they eventually left, Slash brought up the audacity to put his arm around her shoulder. His heart missed half a dozen beats when instead of shaking him off she sneaked a hand into the back-pocket of his jeans. 

"Your place is nearer," she said.

Slash startled. "How do you know where I live?"

"You mentioned it."

It was true, he had mentioned it, but only to Duff. 

"Anyway, we're going to your place."

Slash felt light-headed. He doubted that she only wanted a coffee and a late-night talk. A couple of hours ago, she had been about to stand him up, and now she was steering straight towards his stamp-collection. 

With each step she seemed to press herself closer against his side. Slash could feel her body through the jacket, firm, strong and not very feminine. It didn't matter because for the first time he had the feeling that she was not pretending, not denying, was simply herself and the sudden yielding was the sexiest thing he had ever experienced in his life.

Izzy’s words suddenly rang in his ear: ‘but for those short moments when I had her, really had her…’

Slash had her now. Just the way Izzy had described. And the feeling was fucking brilliant. 

"I'm sorry," he said when he led her up the smelly staircase and into his tiny room. "If I'd known you'd be coming I would have cleaned up a bit."

He kicked a couple of clothes out of the way and wiped and armful of assorted rubbish off the bed. Alexa didn't even seem to notice the chaos the room was in. She dropped her jacket onto the only chair and picked up the guitar, gently touching the neck. 

"This is Izzy's guitar," she said and tucked at a string. "I gave it to him. It was a birthday present. I've been working nightshifts at an assembly-line to pay for it. Why do you have Izzy's guitar?"

"He can't really play anymore," Slash replied, but knew that wasn't enough of a reason for her. 

"I'm not here to talk about Izzy." She set the guitar down, took his hand and led him over to the bed. "Some other time maybe, but not now."

She nudged him down and crawled on top of him, and Slash, too confused by the self-confidence with which she took over command, just let her be. For a fleeting moment he mused over right and wrong, what Izzy would say that he was about to take the last thing from him, and he felt the same pang of guilt that hadn't been strong enough to keep him from opening the letter. 

Alexa touched his hair exactly the way all girls did, like she had wanted to do it from the first moment and was glad the occasion had finally come. She didn't linger too long though, not like she was petting a kitten, and instead took his face into her hands and kissed him. 

She was a good kisser, active and aggressive and Slash just fell open and let her take possession of his mouth. It was hers anyway, had been from the moment Izzy had shown him the photo. It was astounding that it had taken him so long to realize. 

He reached for her hips, pushed the sweat-shirt out of the way to get a feel of skin. Her body was just as hard as everything else about her, even her belly was tight as a man's. Slash felt his way upwards, pulling cloth with him, but when he felt for her breasts, groping around like a blind man searching for the keys he had dropped, he found nothing. 

Slash pushed her back and scrambled away from her, as if she had transformed into a venom-spitting snake. 

"What are you?" he gasped and fought to get his shock under control. 

Alexa's face expressed puzzlement that quickly turned into panic. 

"You knew!" she yelled and her hands flew up in agitation. "Izzy told you, you knew it. You said it didn't matter."

Slash just stared, saw anger and terror flicker over her face in rapid alternation. Before he found his wits to say something, she scrambled off the bed and ran out of the room. 

"Alexa!" Slash exclaimed and made first moves to follow her, but then he just sank back against the headboard. 

A man. Alexa was a man. Izzy had known, Duff had known, only he had been too stupid to notice. Slash covered his face with both hands and tried to keep himself from hyperventilating. A man. He had fallen in love with a man.


	6. Chapter 6

When the next morning came, Slash had one of the worst hangovers of his life. He crawled out of bed and dragged himself towards the bathroom to get ready for the early shift at the market, when he suddenly realized that he didn't have to go anymore. Relieved he swayed back to his bed, the bed he hadn't made love to Alexa in, and pulled the blanket over his head. 

Seattle had never been his type of town, too wet, too damp and too much fish. This time he would be able to buy a bus-ticket. Regular work and being friends with a bartender had enabled him to save a few bucks. 

He couldn't think about Duff without thinking about Alexa. His first reaction had been to put all blame on Izzy, but that wasn't fair. So the love of Izzy's life had been a guy in a skirt. No, not even that, if he was honest. At least he had never seen Alexa in anything that was especially feminine. Jeans and t-shirt and jeans and t-shirt. Maybe she had worn skirts for Izzy, but not for him. Slash shooed the idea away. Being jealous that she hadn't bothered to tart herself up for him was not helping him at all. He liked girls, not guys who pretended to be girls. There was a certain difference, after all. 

No, blaming Izzy was not fair. He hadn't asked him to search for Alexa, and he definitely hadn't asked him to go and seduce her. Putting the blame on Duff was just as wrong. If anybody had been totally against his pursuit, it had been Duff. Duff was a friend and he deserved at least a good-bye. 

Slash had no idea where he should go anyway. L.A. was out of the question. If he wanted to go back to L.A. he could just as well knock at the door of the next cop-shop and ask them to arrest him. It would at least save him the money for the bus. Maybe New York was the right place to go. If he was honest, it didn't matter, as long as it was away from Alexa. 

Alexa. Slash groaned and pushed the blanket away. Just thinking of her made his head pound harder. He could hardly accuse her of not wearing a sign around her neck or maybe a branding on her forehead. All she had done was falling for a guy who didn't want her, but had nevertheless kept pushing and pushing until she had considered it safe to give in. 

If he hadn't brought up Izzy, nothing would have happened. Alexa had granted herself the illusion of a date, but Izzy's name had ripped the dream out of the realm of fantasy and had made it real. Almost. 

Slash rubbed his face and sat up. He was the one who had been lying all the time. He didn't even want to think about how she was feeling now. He had been the cat lying in front of her mouse-hole. He had sweet talked her into believing that his claws were clipped, only to rip her apart as soon as she dared showing herself. He owed her an explanation or at least an apology. 

Her jacket was still hanging over the chair. It wasn't cold enough that she would miss it, but when Slash patted the pockets, he found a set of keys. He doubted that she would come back to fetch them, but when he searched for a wallet, something that contained an address, he found nothing. At least it gave him an excuse to go to the bar first and talk to Duff. 

Duff, every inch the bartender, would tell him that the situation wasn't as fucked up as it seemed to be, that Alexa would get over it, just as she had times before, and that, really, his reaction was understandable, just a big misunderstanding and that one day they would all laugh about the stupidity. He would pour them both a drink, would listen and then he would offer to explain everything to Alexa and all that was left for Slash was going over to make his apology. 

###

It was Friday evening and the bar was busy with the usual set of clients, the type who celebrated each paycheque with getting drunk. Slash caught a glimpse of Claire's dark head bopping up and down inside the glutinous mass of customers, but he couldn't make out Alexa. It would have surprised him if she had shown up for work.

Duff was behind the bar, but even from the door Slash could see that something had disturbed his usual good humour. Maybe Alexa had been faster than him to deliver the report. 

When Duff spotted him, he immediately stopped talking to the drinkers at the bar. For once he wasn't quick with pouring Slash a drink. Instead of a joke or a smile all he got was a glare. 

"In there," Duff said and Slash followed him into the backroom. He closed the door and when he turned around Duff hit him right into his face.

"Fuck!" Slash yelped and collected his bones from the floor. He tasted blood and wiped his mouth on his sleeve. 

"Only what you deserve," Duff said coldly and there was nothing left of the friendly, mellow guy Slash considered as a friend. 

"Deserve for what?" He spat blood onto the floor. "For not wanting to fuck a guy?"

"For hitting her, you asshole," Duff said without raising his voice. 

"Hit her?" After a moment of puzzlement Slash felt anger build. Apparently, everybody had agreed that he was the bad guy in this scenario. "I didn't hit her," he snarled. "She just ran off, the stupid bitch. Even if I wanted, I wouldn't have had the time to hit her. Did she tell you that? That I hit her?"

"No." Duff's face smoothed. "I just assumed, you know, because of…" He touched his cheekbone. "She has a bruise here and her nose was bleeding. Looked like a hit."

Slash shook his head. "That must have happened later. But, fuck, I start to understand why people want to hit her."

"Yeah." Duff smiled apologetically. "Wait a sec." He left the room and came back with a couple of ice-cubes. "Here, sit down," he ordered and Slash lowered himself onto the only available chair, while Duff dapped ice against his split lip.

"She came here, you know," he said needlessly. "Said you still had her keys and that she couldn't go home."

Slash hissed, but didn't stop Duff from rendering first aid. He started to understand why Alexa had travelled across the continent to find shelter under his roof. Duff was good at taking care of people. 

"You still deserved a punch," Duff said. "’cause I told you to keep your hands off.”

He handed Slash the ice cube. 

“You know, the last one put her into hospital."

"Shit," Slash mumbled. So, he hadn't been that far off the mark. 

"I told her that guy wouldn't take it well." Duff laughed without the slightest trace of humour. "An ex-marine, I mean, what was she thinking? When she told him, he went nuts."

"Jesus Christ," Slash mumbled through his hurting mouth. 

"Yeah. Was … bad. Almost killed her. Brain swelling. That one made her careful, I tell you. She even stopped dressing sexy or using make up, or anything like that. Said she never wanted anybody to as much as look at her ever again. And then you barge in and run after her and she's head over heels all again."

"What did she tell you?" he asked

"Not much." Duff scratched his head. "Or maybe I should say, nothing at all. She was crying and bleeding and cursing, but all she wanted was a place to spend the night. 

Duff stopped dapping and handed Slash the ice-cube. 

"So what happened?" he asked. Not even Duff was nice enough to suppress his curiosity. "I guess she told you."

For a moment Slash wondered if he should evade the question, but then he decided that the situation had reached the top of Mount Fuckup anyway. Duff interrupted him only once and only to fetch a bottle of whisky, but apart from that he listened quietly. 

"You know you could sell that story to Hollywood," he said when Slash was done. "So, Izzy's dying? That must have been a shock for her."

"You know Izzy?" Slash asked surprised. 

Duff shook his head. "Only what Alexa told me. She gets these moments you know, and then it's Izzy here, Izzy there for a week and after that she stops mentioning him at all."

"He's missing her." Slash rubbed the remaining ice-cube between his fingers until it had completely melted. 

"Really?" Duff cocked an eyebrow. "Then they're a couple of colossal idiots. Both of them. 'cause then all this drama was completely super fluent. She should have gone to L.A., to Izzy, instead of coming here." He wiped a strand of hair back and his smile turned tired. "She's got her moments, you know. I mean, she's a bitch, but when she's in a good mood she can be absolutely awesome." 

"She does her damned best to hide it," Slash muttered, although he silently agreed. "I have to talk to her, don't I?" 

"Yeah, I guess." Duff shrugged. "Just go upstairs. She might throw something, so be prepared to duck."

Slash sat up. "She's still here? Why didn't you say so earlier?"

"You didn't ask." Duff cast him a lopsided grin. "Anyway, I have a job to do because it's your fault that I'm short of a waitress."

Slash waited until Duff had left the room, before he climbed up the narrow staircase towards the upper room. He knocked at the door, not sure what to say. That was, if she even gave him the time to open her mouth. 

"Fuck off!" Alexa yelled. "I told you I wanted to be fucking…"

She stopped when Slash carefully opened the door.

"Hi," he said.

She was lying on the bed, hugging the blanket as if it was a living being. When she recognized Slash, she sat up and pulled the cover up to her chest. 

"What do you want?" she asked. 

Slash understood why Duff had thought he had beaten her. There was a colourful bruise on her cheek, her nose was swollen and the whole picture was completed by her red eyes and puffy face. She looked like she hadn't stopped crying since she had left his apartment. 

"Apologize," Slash said and closed the door behind himself. "You startled me."

"Yeah, I noticed." Alexa stared at him with open hostility. 

"You have to admit that the situation was a bit unusual." Slash made a couple of steps towards the bed and when she didn't start screaming or throwing things at him, he took the risk and sat down on the edge. 

"You reacted as if I was a monster."

"I know. And I'm sorry. I really am."

Alexa sniffed. "'s OK," she said. "Suppose it's what I had to expect. I should have guessed that Izzy wouldn't tell anybody. He was ashamed of me anyway."

Slash kept silence, although he couldn’t say he believed her. Izzy had never left the impression that he was ashamed of her. Izzy had never left the impression that he was ashamed of anything at all.

"He's missing you," Slash said. "That's why I'm here. You should call him."

For a second the anger was wiped off Alexa's face and replaced by utter disbelief.

"He sent you?" she asked "He…" Her face closed up again and the anger was back. "You've been lying to me."

Slash nodded.

"You've been fucking lying to me right from the beginning. You piece of fucking shit."

Slash shrugged. "Izzy didn't send me. He doesn't even know I'm here. But he's been talking about you and that he's missing you. And I thought, if you had a spark of feeling left for him, maybe you could go and see him." 

"He's really missing me?" Her face smoothed a little.

"Yeah. He says leaving you was the one big mistake in his life."

She smiled a little. "I'd knew he'd eventually understand what an idiot he was," she said. "I told him the day he left, that one day he would come crawling back on his belly. And that I would kick him right into his face."

Slash didn't know what to say. It wasn’t exactly romantic, but probably what he had to expect from those two. 

"What happened to your face?" he asked eventually. 

"Fucking door," she replied. "When I left your fucking house. Somebody opened the door from the outside and I got it right into my face. What happened to yours?" 

"Duff," Slash said. "He was a bit angry when I came in."

"Oh. That's bad." She didn't look like she felt sorry for him. In fact, she looked absolutely pleased. "Does it hurt much?"

Slash nodded to humour her. 

"I brought your jacket," he said. "It's downstairs. And the keys. I figured you'd need it."

"Thank you." 

"Yeah, so…," Slash stood up. "I guess I'll go then." He stuffed his hands into his pockets. "Maybe we'll meet sometime again."

"You mean you're not coming anymore?" Alexa frowned. 

"No, I guess…," Slash studied his shoes "I guess I'll leave town."

"Oh. Yeah sure, if you only came here because of Izzy. Say hi to him from me, OK?" 

"You're not going to call him?"

Alexa shrugged. "I don't know."

"Do you want his number?" He shouldn't even have it, but he had talked one of the nurses into giving him the address of the place they had taken Izzy to. 

"Yeah, leave it, if you like."

Slash crammed the piece of paper out of his wallet.

"I'll leave it here on the desk." He dropped it onto a stack of bills. Duff wasn't exactly tidy when it came to bookkeeping. "See you then."

"Yeah," Alexa said. "See you."

###

A few hours later, Slash sat on the bed, the packed bag at his feet. He had done all there was to do. Alexa had Izzy's number, Duff had given him a bottle of whisky, a hug and had in exchange demanded the promise that Slash would visit should he ever return to Seattle. Which they both knew, wouldn’t happen.

He felt for the ticket in his pocket. Open destination. The guitar was still leaning in the corner and slowly Slash realized that he would leave it behind. He should have given it to Alexa. Izzy, Alexa, for him this chapter was over. Maybe it had been the right thing to do, but at this moment Slash didn't feel any satisfaction. If anything, the heap of shards at his feet had grown another foot. His future wasn't worth a penny and even the hope that Alexa might come around and call Izzy was a feeble one. And if she did, what difference did it make? All this effort and drama for nothing. 

Slash stood up and put his jacket on. There was no sense in dragging things out. He had just picked up his bag, when he heard a feeble knock on the door. 

"Hi," Alexa said when he opened. She didn't look at him, just studied her shoes, hands thrust into the pockets of her jacket and hair hanging into her face. "Can I come in?"

Slash made a step to the side to let her pass. 

"So, you're about to leave?" She mustered the bag.

"Yes."

Now that he knew the truth, it was obvious that she wasn't a girl. Her shoulders were an inch too wide, the lines of her face a touch too hard, her hands just a little bit too big. The illusion was good, but not perfect. 

"I called." She turned around and looked at him. For once her eyes weren't hard. "He died last Wednesday."

Slash faltered. The news hit him like a punch into the stomach. 

"Izzy?" he asked needlessly. 

"No, the king of Siam." Alexa climbed onto the bed. She propped her back up against the wall and pulled her knees towards her chest. "If you want to go, don't let me keep you."

"I'm not in a hurry." It didn't matter when he left, there was always a bus going somewhere and one place was just as good as the other. As long as it was away. 

"We went to school together," she said. "Izzy and me." She wiped at her eyes, but didn’t start crying. Maybe she didn’t have any tears left. 

Slash took off his jacket and sat down next to her. He handed her a cigarette before he lit one for himself and she sucked greedily. 

"Back when I was still William Bailey." 

Slash didn't look at her, just inhaled smoke and let it go in slow motion. There were a million questions burning on his tongue, but he wasn't sure this was the moment to ask. She wasn’t informing him about anything, she just needed to talk about Izzy. 

"When did you…," he bit his tongue, but Alexa was grateful for the prompt. 

"It wasn't my idea. Me and Izzy, we were together since pretty much the beginning. He started it, not me. The first time he kissed me, I hit him right into his face. He didn't say anything, just nodded and left. Two days later I was knocking at his door and begged him to do it again." Her head fell forward until her chin rested on her knees. The cigarette smouldered between her fingers and she didn't even notice when ash dropped onto the sheets. "Pathetic, huh?"

Slash pulled the photo out of his wallet and gave it to her. It was a miracle to him how he could have ever mistaken the boy in the picture for a girl. Yes, there was a certain femininity, but not much more than a lot of adolescent boys expressed. Izzy had told him Alexa was a girl and he had never questioned it. 

"Yeah, that was about that time." She traced Izzy's face with her finger and when she handed it back to Slash, he shook his head. 

"Keep it."

"Nobody knew, you know." She stared at the picture, at the boy she had once been, at the other boy who had broken her heart. "Lafayette is not the town where you want people to know something like that about you."

"It looks pretty obvious to me in that picture." 

Alexa shook her head. "It's the type of photo everybody takes when they're drunk. Hugging your best mate, making rude jokes and somebody snaps a picture. No, nobody suspected anything. I can say that for sure because my stepfather would have killed me if there had been as much as a rumour. He would have beaten me to death."

She didn’t say it like a figure of speech. It was only and impulse, but when Slash put an arm around her shoulder, Alexa yielded and leant into it. 

"One day," she said, "when I was at his house and his parents where out, he gave me a skirt and told me to put it on. I exploded. I yelled at him and screamed that he was the most perverted dickhead in the world and that I would go and fuck girls from now on."

Slash stroked her hair and she put her head down on his shoulder. 

"He didn't even try to interrupt me. Just let me rave until I was out of breath. Then he asked if I was done and when I said 'yes', he told me to put on the skirt."

Slash chuckled. That was Izzy just as he remembered him. 

"What did you do?" he asked when he more felt than heard Alexa snicker. 

She sighed. "I put it on. And when he brought me other clothes, I put them on, too. He stole them in the locker rooms at school. It wasn't only clothes, but also jewellery and make-up. Sometimes, when a girl wore something he liked, he'd point her out, saying that he would get it for me. I think it was a game to him. He went through their stuff during gym-class and dragged the loot home."

"And you?" Slash asked. 

"I never started it myself, and I think I really believed that I was only doing it for Izzy, because he was a perverted asshole. But I loved him and I told myself, that if it got him off, that I was OK with it as long as he didn't run around and talked about it. Which he never did. He knew my stepfather and he knew … I mean, usually he’d have been the type to rub something like that into people’s faces, but he respected that. That I was so paranoid about anything coming out." 

She fell silent and Slash wondered whether she would mind if he asked about the break-up. 

"I almost didn't believe it when he told me he would go to L.A. Just like that. One day he informed me that he would go to California to form a band and the next day he was gone. He said something about being free and doing what he had to do and bla, bla, bla." 

Alexa's hand trembled when she brought the cigarette up to her lips for a deep drag. "He said I had to sort myself out on my own and that he couldn't help me. I told him that I had always known that he was nothing but a motherfucking piece of shit and that I was glad to be rid of him and his perversions. And that he should never show his fucking homo-ass on my doorstep ever again." 

She had smoked the cigarette down to the filter and Slash handed her a new one. 

"I left Lafayette only a couple of months later. I went to Chicago and got a job. And then, one evening, I couldn't stop thinking about Izzy. He was just there, in my head, and he wouldn't go away while I was sitting in my shit-hole of an apartment. I had one of those skirts in my wardrobe. It had somehow gotten between my stuff when I moved and I … you know… I put it on. And it felt like home."

Slash extinguished his cigarette on the nightstand, not caring that he burned a hole into the plastic-surface. Whatever it was inside Alexa that was running against convention, Izzy had sensed it and brought it out against her will. It was the 'why' that escaped him. To do her a favour? Hardly. Izzy didn't do favours. They had still been kids, maybe he had just enjoyed the power he held over Alexa without thinking about the consequences. Was Alexa happier now than she would have been if she had lived her life as a man? It was impossible to say. Maybe Alexa was somebody who would be unhappy, no matter which direction her life was taking. Maybe happiness wasn't inside her. 

"I started to really try it out a couple of weeks later, looking if I could pass as a chick. And it was so fucking easy." She faltered and Slash had the feeling that she was shrinking in his arms. "I'm nothing. I'm not a man and I'm not a girl. I'm neither."

"Maybe you're both," Slash said softly. 

"That's what Izzy always said," Alexa whispered and Slash had the feeling that she was too close to tears to speak louder. "The best and the worst of both sides, that's what he used to say to me."

Slash didn't answer. What did people say in cases like this? Or did they close their eyes and cover their ears?

"I don't want you to go."

Slash looked away, pretending he hadn't heard. 

"You said you liked me."

"I do." He let his hair fall into his eyes and fiddled for another cigarette. 

"Then why are you leaving?"

Slash forced himself to look at her. She was exasperated, like he had proposed to marry her the day before and was running off with another girl today. 

The inner emptiness was almost painful. For weeks he had been held capture by the riddle that was Alexa. She had occupied his days and his nights and there was nothing he could replace her with. Now that he was free to go, freedom wasn't what he wanted. Instead he yearned to be held hostage again. 

"Alexa," he started, but she stopped him with a sharp jerk of her head. 

"I know you don't want me. Nobody wants me. I get that. That's not what I'm saying. It still doesn't mean you have to leave."

Slash hesitated. 

"What's your fucking problem?" Alexa snapped when he didn't answer. "You tell me all this shit about how it's all fine and OK, but admit it, just looking at me gives you the creeps. I'm not asking you to fuck me or anything like that, but you can't even look at me without thinking that your fucking masculinity is in danger. So, yeah, so I'm a freak. I didn't ask for it, you dickhead. But you, do you know what you are? You are…"

"Alexa!" Slash interrupted her. He took her face into both hands and wondered if he could do it. "There's nothing wrong with being a freak."

He could, it turned out, although it took a bit of an effort to get started. Kissing her, although it wasn't the first time, was easier than he had feared. Lips were lips and a tongue was a tongue and the slight scraping of stubbles wasn't enough to put him off. 

"So, who's the freak now?" She smiled sheepishly. 

"I still can't do it," Slash said. "I'm sorry."

He wished it didn't matter, but it did. She had a dick in her pants and wishing it wasn't there wouldn't make it go away. 

"That's OK." Alexa shifted until she could put her head onto his shoulder.

"We could be just friends," Slash said and wrapped his arms around her. "We can still do shit together."

"Cool." She caught a curl, twisted it around her finger and tucked. "You're staying then?"

"Yeah, I guess." Slash felt for the ticket. Open date and open destination. He wasn't in a hurry. "I just … can't fuck you."

"No, you can't," Alexa said and Slash was glad that they were even on this. "But you will learn. With time. Don’t worry, I'll teach you."

\- Fin -


End file.
